Sorrow-stone

by Sara Norja

Sorrow-stone, listen, I've travelled through the marshes
of Magar to reach you. I’ve braved the fire-worm wastes.
May I weave through your core, tell you my grief?
Will you let me pass to the other side,
shoulders scraped, soul squeezed dry of tears?

I've swallowed the grief you bear for others.
Go now, live unburdened for a while.
This is what I exist for. The moon shrinks and swells.
People give their grief to me, and summer-hundreds pass
as I wait on this hill, a lonely moss-gatherer.

How many tears can sink into my mineral heart
before it cracks?

Stones also have their sorrow.

Sara Norja dreams in two languages and has a predilection for tea. Born in England and currently settled in Helsinki, Finland, she lives for words, dance, and moments of wonder. Her poetry has appeared in publications such as Curio, Strange Horizons, Through the Gate, Plunge Magazine, Niteblade, and Interfictions. She blogs here.

When asked of what poem the word "cherry" immediately makes her think, Sara replied as follows: "The first wordcrafty example that the word 'cherry' makes me think of is actually a song, not a poem: Tori Amos's 'Snow Cherries from France'."

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